Here's how producer Neal Edelstein, who's working with NASCAR Vice President Zane Stoddard on the project, described in broad terms what he termed the "underdog story:"

"The story is about kind of a misfit kid who was into racing as a youth because of his father's passion for the sport. And his father's death ... pushed him out of the sport and he's a bit of a loner now, kind of on the fringes, [doing] dirt-bike riding, doing odd jobs involving racing and testing and motorcycles.

"So it becomes really his journey to kind of harness his ability, harness his emotions, and he gets back into the sport ... with the help of some people his father was involved with," Edelstein said.

Stoddard added that the driver in the story has "this inherent skill that his dad passed on. But he's turned his back on the sport" as a result of his dad's death.

It would be a contemporary movie and its working title is "Finding Speed."

"We wanted to do something authentic -- not just authentic on the track but authentic to the culture of [NASCAR] and to the spirit of the sport," Stoddard said.

But Stoddard cautioned that although Universal Pictures is financing the film's early development, including the initial script, that does not yet mean the movie has a green slight to be made.